'Gundam: The Origin' Manga Review

Ollie Barder
, ContributorI cover gaming in Japan as well the pop-culture here.Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

About fifteen or so years ago, various people attempted a few retellings of the original Gundam. The first of these was a brave re-imagining in the form of a serialized novel known as For the Barrel but it was sadly never finished. The other major attempt was the Gundam: The Origin manga.

Starting in 2001 it was serialized in Gundam Ace magazine, this being a monthly manga periodical focused entirely on various Gundam series. What made The Origin different from its competition was that it was penned by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko.

Yasuhiko was no stranger to Gundam, as he was the original character designer and one of the main animation directors on the first Mobile Suit Gundam. Many also thought that he brought much of the warmth and narrative pacing to the original series and movies, rather than the show’s frontrunner and writer Yoshiyuki Tomino.

At the end of 2011, after an impressive stint of ten years, The Origin manga finished. For those that had been reading the series, it was eminently clear by that point that Yasuhiko was indeed the real reason behind the first Gundam’s success. As he’d recaptured that special something that had made the first series and movies so remarkable and enduring.

Like any good retelling, Yasuhiko changed a lot around in The Origin but did so with a great deal of understanding and insight. Events changed and characters did different things but all the while staying true to the spirit of the host work. The mecha also took a more sophisticated turn as did their narrative creation, with both sides of the conflict having mobile suits from the outset of the story.

A good example of this is shown in the very first volume. As the famous beginning to the series has the young Amuro Ray enter the RX-78-2 Gundam and destroys two Zaku II mobile suits without ever having piloted anything before. In the anime this was used to show that there was more to this kid than met the eye but it also missed out a lot of context.

For instance, if the Gundam that Amuro piloted was the RX-78-2 then where was the RX-78-1? How did the Zaku II’s get so far into enemy territory without any form of resistance? This was basic narrative context that was omitted in the anime, either due to lack of time or a creative disagreement.

In the manga, we get to see the invading Zaku II’s face an experienced pilot in the RX-78-1 (shown above) and have them destroy it utterly. So when Amuro gets into his Gundam and takes them out, it’s all the more impressive.

The Origin is littered with these kinds of changes, many of which feel like they were intended for the original anime but were cut. They almost come across like a form of belated vindication on the part of Yasuhiko, as he’s finally telling the story he originally wanted to.

When the manga finished in 2011, nobody thought we’d ever get to see a localized release outside of Japan. Thankfully a few years ago Vertical picked up the license and they have been steadily publishing hardback versions of the entire series.

Spread across 12 volumes, with the last of these to be released hopefully in December of this year, Vertical has done a great job with The Origin.

While Yasuhiko is known for his anime work, he is also one of the manga greats too. With classic series like Venus Wars and Arion, he made a name for himself as not only a solid storyteller but as an exceptional artist.

This means that The Origin is clearly a labor of love by someone that not only knows the host work inside out but also an artist with decades of experience. The result is one of the best drawn and told manga works of recent memory.

To this end Vertical have clearly taken great care with The Origin. Each edition is suitably pristine and pretty large too. As Western manga releases go, it feels like genuinely good value for money.

The manga clearly shows that Yasuhiko is a master of his craft and Vertical have stayed true to that with their lovely hardback editions.

So if you want to understand the fuss around the original Gundam, or even read one of the better manga works out there, then Gundam: The Origin is definitely worth checking out.

The manga is available on Amazon (US). Vertical also sent me the first six volumes to review.